DESIRE has its role in sport, but sometimes you can want something too much. The last cricket season for Fraser Watts was supposed to be about confirming his World Cup place with Scotland. What should have been a crossing the Ts exercise almost saw him scribble out his whole name as his mental focus became a complete blur. So worried was the 27-year-old batsman that a slump in form might cost him his international spot, that it almost became a self-fulfilling prophecy. After years of spadework, Watts nearly dug his own grave.

On the day the squad to West Indies was eventually announced, Watts was at his Edinburgh banking job when he took a call from Mike Stanger, the Saltires spokesman. “Just calling to get your reaction,” said Stanger. There was a silence at the other end of the phone. “Get my reaction to what exactly?” replied Watts after the nervous pause. Happily, Stanger was able to relate good news. Despite everything, Watts was in. “Mike then said his congratulations to which my only reaction was ‘Oh Christ, thank God for that’,” relates Watts.

His mixed season had started slowly then come to a complete halt. He had finished the previous Saltires campaign with impressive 50s against Derbyshire and Warwickshire, but his highest score was an unbeaten 22 this time around before he was dropped after being dismissed for just three against Yorkshire at Headingley on May 29. June and July passed without a return to the Scotland team, a period in which Watts has since admitted his ego took a dent. He was no longer Fraser Watts of Greenock and Scotland, just plain old Fraser Watts of Greenock.

His response he admits was the wrong one. He looked for someone to blame. “I suppose initially like a lot of people might react, I just felt it wasn’t fair, that it wasn’t my fault,” he says. “It took me a while to calm down. I had known at the start of the summer that I had a pretty good chance of getting into the Scotland World Cup squad, I was one of the regular players, but I sort of let it get to me. I became quite worried about the whole World Cup thing to the point where it was occupying my mind the whole summer. I just couldn’t seem to relax and play.

“Every time I went out to bat rather than just think, ‘What can I do today?’ it was always, ‘What if I don’t get any runs today? What then?’ It was funny because people kept saying to me, ‘Ach you’re out of form, how does it feel?’ but I never really felt out of form, it was just that the World Cup had become a great burden to me. I’d worked so hard to get us there having been involved in the ICC Trophy success in Ireland so the prospect of missing out on the big prize was awful. I don’t really know how I’d have felt had Mike said that day I was out, but it would have been horrible and I’d have felt pretty hard done by. Because of my contribution over the years, privately I would have been annoyed, too.”

Watts was recalled in August for the European Championships hosted in Ayr. His first match of the tournament saw him dismissed for two against the Netherlands at Cambusdoon. Two days later, he faced Denmark at New Anniesland in Glasgow and suddenly, finally, everything came right again. Watts blasted his way to 171 not out in a score of 298 for four against the Danes, the fifth highest knock by a Scottish batsman in any form of cricket.

“That game was a big turning point for me in the year,” says Watts. “I know they’re not the strongest side, but I felt the way I got the runs made the difference and it was what I needed after a tough season. In the months before that a lot of people had tried to offer me advice, until eventually I realised I had to tell myself what I was doing wrong. It was a hard time and there were a few sleepless nights. I was annoyed at what had happened, but eventually I was able to step back and think about it. If something like it happens again, I’ll know how to deal with it better.”

Having emerged from the other side, a winter of effectively being a full-time professional cricketer awaits Watts, starting with Friday’s first of two one-day internationals in Bangladesh. Back in 1998, he made his Scotland debut against the same opposition at Boghall. “I’ve come a long way since then,” says Watts. “People ask if I’m disappointed never to have played county cricket, but you have to be an exceptional player to make it and I just wasn’t good enough when I was younger. I’ve still done lots with Scotland, though. I’ve lived on nothing for years in terms of money, but it’s been great to travel the world. It’s been worth the sacrifice.” Whether he would still be saying that if he hadn’t made it to the West Indies, thankfully, Watts will never know.